Today we bought a new car, the first one we have purchased together since we were married. Some of you may recall that Melissa bought a Honda CR-V in 2002, a couple years before she and Chris first met. At the time they started dating Chris was driving a Montero that had some unusual characteristics. For example, one night when we kissed while sitting in the car the engine started spontaneously without the key in the ignition (!?!). Some time later, after Melissa became Chris’ sugar-mama, Chris stopped driving it altogether and later noticed that a tree had started growing out of the passenger door. This was how he knew it was time to give it up, and since then we have been a one car family.

The color Odyssey we purchased is “smoky topaz”, which sounds much more mysterious than our lives actually are.

The interior is “truffle”, which sounds much more pretentious than our lives actually are. We chose the colors by process of elimination: they didn’t have blue, and white was out of the question. All of the remaining colors are so ambiguous that we would be hard pressed to name them when we fill out our motor vehicle registration. The color we purchased is in fact so nondescript that Melissa accidentally started following another Honda Odyssey on the way home from the dealer. Instead of ending up at our house she found herself at The Chancery in the village.

We chose the Odyssey after going through an extensive process of evaluating different makes and models. We ruled out the Volvo station wagon, as well as a number of “crossover” vehicles (whatever that means). We wanted sliding doors, easy access to all seats and features that would work well for a family. The distinguishing feature of the Odyssey over the Sienna was the flexibility in carseat locations: the Odyssey has LATCH connectors for 5 car seats, enough for the kids and a couple friends. The car is unbelievably deluxe compared to what we had when we were growing up. When Chris was in grade school his Dad bought a Chevy cargo van, built benches in the back and lined the whole thing in yellow and orange shag carpet (you can almost hear Austin Powers saying “Yeah Baby!”). The driver and passenger had lap belts, but there were no other safety features to be found. There was certainly no movie player, climate control, etc. I’ve been thinking about telling Everett how good he has it, but I suspect he would grasp it about as well as I did at his age.